They must be offering accelerated courses in indie-pop
adorability at Ivy League schools  how else to
explain the seeming ease with which this trio, formed at
Tufts University in Massachusetts in '93, was ready for the
close-up of its wonderful self-produced debut album inside
of two years?

Besides the exquisite title track, the preliminary
Passion Play EP is nearly a waste: its three long
non-LP songs are a watery Jonathan Richman indulgence
("Means"), the junk-rock nonsense of "Radio Days" and the
catchy but minor "Howl." But that was the end of the
impertinence.

On Papas Fritas, the group sounds as fresh and
youthful as an after-school milk commercial 
notwithstanding guitarist/pianist Tony Goddess' occasional
tendency to affect a lazy J Mascis/pothead creak in his
singing  and turns extraordinarily fetching pop
concoctions like "Lame to Be," "TV Movies," "Possibilities"
and "Smash This World" into disarmingly sophisticated and
diverse small-scale charmers with abundant skill and no
evidence of effort. Crossing a strong aroma of '60s time-
capsule folk-rock (imparted by acoustic guitar, simple
piano and simple harmony-vocal arrangements, plus a little
chamber quartet action on "Passion Play") with a post-
modern sense of onrushing fuzz-guitar whimsy, Papas Fritas
come off on its self-titled album like a crisp and focused
Beat Happening on one hand and a Brian Wilson-obsessed
Modern Lovers on the other. Drummer Shivika Asthana
provides a delightful vocal foil for Goddess; if they're
not quite Sonny and Cher for the practice-amp set, Papas
Fritas is still a reason to believe in the value of higher
education.

Helioself brings Papas Fritas out to frolic in a
calm, dewy clearing ringed by XTC, the White Album
Beatles, 10cc, Stackridge and others. It flows like a well-
programmed jukebox: unified by a rustic disposition, the
album's stylistic diversity feels comfortably natural, the
songs instantly familiar without being selfconscious or
specifically derivative. Rinkydink spinet nostalgia caroms
comfortably into angular guitar rock on "Captain of the
City"; "Live by the Water" is subliminal calypso. Sitar
seeps into "Hey Hey You Say" and then washes right out,
leaving no gimmicky aftertaste to color the bouncy "We've
Got All Night." (But "Weight," which goes the whole 78 rpm
compression route of novelty songs like "Winchester
Cathedral," should have been left on the studio shelf.)
Indulging a maritime bent, the trio applies its sweetly
harmonized voices to agreeably translucent lyrics about
experiences (the beach brawl of "Rolling in the Sand"),
ambitions ("Live by the Water"), observations ("Who needs a
myth when you're young and free?," asks Asthana in the
breezy "Say Goodbye") and demands ("Sing About
Me"). "Starting to Be It," which ends the album on a gently
soulful note, answers the oblique title with the
refrain, "We're not there yet." Yes you are.